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Does anyone else feel like the porn star stuff is a deliberate media distraction away from bigger material?

I think he has some fantasy that if he forces a shutdown then the Democrats will bend his way and he can look like a big hero. And even if it backfires on the GOP (which I have my doubts about as I think "Libruls only care about illegal aliens taking over our country1111!1!!" will have traction), he won't care because he will just say they should have listened to him.

He always has to be right and everyone has to kiss up to him and coddle his worst impulses.

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Does anyone else feel like the porn star stuff is a deliberate media distraction away from bigger material?

One news outlet report stated that they thought that this was more important than some garden variety sex scandal, due to the fact that Trump Inc. created a Delaware-based LLC. in order to pay her the 'hush money' just a month before the election. (my guess is they are trying to delineate where the money came from--personal accounts or campaign cash?)

They may be thinking about Bannon's money laundering allegations and tying it into Trump's shady financial dealings (especially since the WSJ was the first media outlet to report this).

I'm not sure how significant this is but I do believe it merits higher than mere distraction (though personally, I'd rather not hear the gory details of his sexcapades because...vomit).

12 hours ago, dragonflies said:

10 hours ago, Khan said:

Hate to burst anyone's bubble -- especially a rag like the NY Daily News -- but "generic sex" is the ONLY kind of sex that man knows how to have.

Wow. The NRA might be in on this too? SOOOOOOOOOOOOO many unclean hands in all this.

From the land that created the Kalashnikov (the man and the assault rifle)?

This doesn't surprise me in the least.

The U.S. and Russia are both major arms dealers with networks that span the global to the grassroots. The arms trade is likely more connected than the global drug trade. Actually, they likely go hand-in-hand.

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Does anyone else feel like the porn star stuff is a deliberate media distraction away from bigger material?

I think it could be, since (according to NPR) four other media outlets have tried in the past to break this story, but got nowhere. But, OTOH, wouldn't it be incredible if THIS, and NOT the Russia [&#33;@#&#036;%^&amp;*], is the thing that ends up being Trump's undoing as president? (I'm not saying it WILL be. I'm just saying it would be amazing if it were.) After all, Watergate began as just a routine break-in.

“In a press conference about the new Conscience and Religious Freedom Division, Roger Severino, a senior HHS official, said it was necessary to shield medical staffers who deny care on religious grounds, comparing their situation with that of Jews who were slaughtered during the Holocaust and Martin Luther King Jr. in his quest for racial justice.”

So the question here is between two groups of people claiming their fundamental rights are being infringed upon.

The first believes they have a right to basic health care regardless of their gender or sexual orientation.

The other believes they have a right to deny them basic health care due to their religious beliefs.

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Some media entities really seem to be emphasizing the financial undercurrents regarding Trump and Russia, suggesting that money laundering may now be the focus of the investigation.

Reading this article was interesting in how, on its face, it discusses the possible purge of U.S. intel sources while examining, once again, how mob-adjacent Trump Inc. has always been (this time it's the Russians) as well as how comfortable the Trump organization seems to be at playing this kind of shell game with money (e.g. the golf course section).

The reality is that Trump has likely been practicing more money laundering through his various companies than the Godfather did through his olive oil venture but the sad news is that if he's half as proficient in covering his tracks as his mentor Vladimir, the evidence may not be found for years (if ever).

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Does anyone else feel like the porn star stuff is a deliberate media distraction away from bigger material?

No. Almost nothing Trump does is deliberate or some secret media strategy - it's just flailing. Daniels came out because she felt like it. It doesn't help Trump, it's just another scandal - and it hasn't lessened any of the bigger ones.

A few pundits had this same theory a lot early on; they assumed there was some secret strategy behind Trump's constant chaos, that it was some big play. It's not. Everyone involved in his empire, both in the past and now, is just that much of a blithering incompetent.